Secret Recipe Malaysia Competitive Priorities Report 4tu15

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Assalamualaikum WBT,

Alhamdulillah, we are very grateful to the Almighty God, who have bestowed us the will to complete our assignment about “Competitive Priorities at Secret Recipe” which is connected to our scheme Service Management, HTH 500. Here, we would like to take this opportunity to express our highest gratitude and compliment to the people who are involved directly or indirectly in this assignment especially our beloved course lecturer, Miss Zatul Iffah.

In this assignment, we examine that the importance of appropriate and suitable service and distribution system that can be applied in a foodservice establishment based on few factors. We have also analyzed the importance of equipments in determining the efficiency of the service that will be delivered to the customer. Based on our observation at the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, we have concluded our research in a form of SWOT analysis. We really hope that our research can be use as reference for another student in the future.

Thank you to all people who are involved in making our assignment a successful one and may all your help and effort are blessed.

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INTRODUCTION

Organizations should know details about competitive priorities in order to become a successful in the business. Does matter the ways they understand, yet all of them shared the same objective which is to be a successful and well known in their business. The report consists of data from the research and analysis conducted at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu. This report shared all the information and relevant data based on the interviewers well as observation at the establishment. The report also show on how the organization use their resources and their idea, information and applied them in their organization. This report discussed mainly about the competitive priorities, the order winners and the order qualifiers that used by the organization.

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TABLE OF CONTENT NO

TITLE

PAGE

1.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

1

2.

INTRODUCTION

2

3.

TABLE OF CONTENT

3

4.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

4

5.

SECRET RECIPE BACKGROUND

5

6.

SECRET RECIPE AWARDS

6

7.

SECRET RECIPE PHILOSOPHY

7

8.

COMPANY BACKGROUND

8

9.

SECRET RECIPE’S ORGANIZATION CHART

9

10.

MARKET SUMMARY & TARGET MARKET

10

11.

TARGET MARKET DEMOGRAPHIC

11

12.

ORDER QUALIFIERS

12

13.

COMPETATIVE PRIORITIES

16

14.

ORDER WINNERS

19

15.

SWOT ANALYSIS

24

16.

THE CUSTOMER

28

17.

RECOMMENDATION AND SUGGESTION

33

18.

CONCLUTION

35

19

APPENDICES

37

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Executive Summary Secret Recipe is the leading restaurant and bakery café in Malaysia as well as in ASEAN is still expanding its wings with growing demands and customer. Secret Recipe serves fine quality and delicious homemade cake and pastries together with fusion food of Asia’s dishes and beverages. Secret Recipe is targeting for individuals, families and take out customers with higher income by selling high quality, innovative products at a moderate price, deg tasteful, convenient locations and providing high quality customer service. This is in line with Secret Recipe’s principle which is to gin the best for all its valued customers.

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SECTION 1 SECRET RECIPE BACKGROUND

Secret Recipe, a popular lifestyle cafe chain, has become a household name following its debut in 1997. Secret Recipe has successfully established in brand name in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, China, Philippines, Pakistan, Brunei and Australia by virtue of its fine quality cakes, fusion food and distinctive service.

A leading and largest cafe chain in Malaysia, with Halal certification awarded by Jabatan Kemajuan Islam Malaysia (JKIM), Secret Recipe in committed to continue to adhere to the standards of preparations of all food and processing plant in the restaurant in accordance to the regulatory guideline including HAC and VHM guidelines. Customers can always enjoy in confidence from more than twenty (20) types of fusion food, forty (40) cakes creations and pastries, with a flavourful range of ice cream and beverages offered in all Secret Recipe outlets.

In a short period of thirteen years, Secret Recipe has experienced a rapid growth of over one hundred and fifty (150) cafes throughout the region. Secret Recipe continuously strives to surplus its own accomplishments and to be recognized as a leader in the industry.

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SECRET RECIPE AWARDS

Secret Recipe has earned numerous awards due to its achievement in the industry and below is some of the prominent awards they won. “Most Competitive Company Award 2003” “Malaysia Book of Record 2003” “ Superbrand of Malaysia 2003-4 ” “SMI Brand Builder of The Year Award 2004” “Excellent Food Award 2004 – Singapore” “Product Excellence Award 2005” “Most Promising Franchisor of The Year Award 2005-6” “Malaysia Best Halal Restaurant of The Year 2005” “Most Promising Franchisor of the Year Award 2005” “SMB Brand Building Award 2005” “Best Restaurant Award 2006 – Indonesia” “Golden Bull Award 2006” “Enterprise 50 Award 2006” “SMB Brand Building Award 2006” “BestBrand Food & Beverage Cafes 2006-2007” “Best Local Restaurant Chain 2006” “International Franchisor of the Year 2007” “Franchise of the Year 2007” “Homegrown Franchise of the Year Award 2007” “Best Sales Growth Award 2007” “Best Brand Food & Beverage Cafe 2007” “TOP TEAM 50 Enterprise Award 2007” ”Best Casual Dining Restaurant of The Year 2007/2008”

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SECRET RECIPE PHILOSOPHY

ORGANIZATION OBJECTIVE To provide the best and highest satisfaction to all its valued customers

ORGANIZATION MISSION Globalizing Secret Recipe into international market and becoming the best cake shop cum café in the world

ORGANIZATION VISION To achieve two hundred and fifty 250 outlets by the year 2015

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SECRET RECIPE KUALA TERENGGANU Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu is located at Wisma Cemerlang along Jalan Sultan Zainal Abidin, closed to the famous traditional fishing village of Kampong Tanjung and located just minutes away from the shopping and commercial districts of Kuala Terengganu. Being the only Secret Recipe in Kuala Terengganu, this casual dining establishment offers 20 tables and could accommodate maximum 80 patrons at a time. Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu offers smoking and non smoking area for the customer convenience

together

with

complimentary

broadband

wireless

within

the

establishment. Opened in 2006, the restaurant has witnessed mammoth amount of demand from the customer in the area especially during special occasion such as Chinese New Year, Mother’s Day, birthdays and others. Opened from 10.00am until 11.00pm, Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu can achieve maximum turnover of twelve (12) per table a day especially during beginning of every month. The restaurant received all their product in form of packed, chilled and frozen from their central manufacturing plant in Klang Valley. The product later will be thawed, cooked or chill depending on their requirement. Operating with 20 employees, the restaurant applied two shifts daily and opened for 365 days a year.

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SECRET RECIPE KUALA TERENGGANU ORGANIZATION CHART

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MARKET SUMMARY Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu has good information about marketing through their franchise concept and knew a great deal about how to attract and maintain loyal customers. All the data, information and training will be provided by the franchisor to maintain their standard of service. It will leverage on the franchising scheme which rely on master franchisor to serve and understand the needs of the people better.

TARGET MARKET The target market of secret recipe in Kuala Terengganu will be the individuals and young families in the age range of 20 – 40 years old. This will be the best market because they are more willing to try new kind of foods. They are less averse compared to the older generation. They also target the medium and upper class society because they have good financial backgrounds and afford to buy the food in secret recipe which is bit expensive if compare to the others outside food. Besides that, target market for secret recipe is also on cheese cake lovers because it is well known with its cheese cake.

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TARGET MARKET DEMOGRAPHIC Below we believe are the profiles of Secret Recipe’s target market customers; a) Geographic - Geographically, Secret Recipe is targeting city of Kuala Terengganu which has a population of 407,000 people -The targeted market is around 200,000 people

b) Demographic - Male and female - Ages 20-54, this segment makes up 80% of the market - Young families who live in the urban area - Have attended college and/or graduate school - Middle to upper class income families - Eat out couple times a week - Prefer high quality restaurants

c) Behaviour factors - Enjoy a high quality meal without the mess of making it - Enjoy tasting different kind of food - Prefer quick and healthy meals - Health concern in regards of foods - Like good presentation of foods

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ORDER QUALIFIERS WHAT? Order qualifiers are the first step before establishing the competitive priorities. Order qualifiers are those competitive priorities that everyone in the industry must have just to be able to compete. Secret Recipe is Malaysian-born franchise business, falls under the casual dining establishment categories with cake as their business product and also offers varieties of pastries, beverages, Western and Asian foods. Although they provide several other foods and drinks, they still never lose their brand awareness and popularity over their cakes Their order qualifiers are believed to be standard with other café’s and restaurant’s offered in the industry and also depending on the market need. After conducting our research and surveys, below are the qualifiers that we believed attached to the Secret Recipe;

1. To provide utmost service for customer satisfaction. 2. To provide wide selection of cakes, pastries and their other products. 3. To provide foods in fast or minimal period of time. 4. To provide quality, presentable and healthy foods and beverages. 5. Product offered is affordable and competitive. 6. Offering accessibility with option of dining in or take out.

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WHY? The reason why the order qualifiers for Secret Recipes are established in that way in simply because it is the standard services and products offered by other similar establishment in the industry. Thus, all the standard offering has becoming as the order qualifiers that Secret Recipe should met in order to compete with their competitors. We also believed that Secret Recipe has carefully conducted a research of the market trend in order for them to choose the correct qualifiers which believed may satisfies the demand from the market. Secret Recipe concentrated their qualifiers toward young families who are educated and like to try other taste than traditional foods which are also more demanding of their foods in numbers of ways; 1. Food quality: They prefer high quality ingredients because they become more health conscious 2. Presentation / appearance: This will be one the major attraction to try different kind of foods and appreciate their taste 3. Health consciousness: Malaysia’s health system has improved and this may lead to request of healthier foods especially in the urban area where customers are looking for more healthy alternatives foods when they dine out. 4. Selection: Kuala Terengganu peoples are more receptive now to different kind of foods so they are willing to try large selection of foods offered by Secret Recipe.

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HOW? Secret Recipe anticipate their order qualifiers very efficiently as they have the accessibility to tremendous amount of information from their franchising scheme and based on our research, below are the ways of Secret Recipe delivering their order qualifiers;

1. To provide utmost service for customer satisfaction. Secret Recipe has utilized their franchising advantages by providing training for their employees, providing high standard of service, creating a friendly and pleasant ambience, employees that is attentive and helpful towards their customer needs which are believed will led them to total customer satisfaction.

They also conducted Quality Survey Program once a month where a mystery shopper will come to each shop and will evaluate the service delivered. Comment cards also offered for customer to write in any of their valuable information, recommendation and also their complaint if any.

2. To provide wide selection of cakes, pastries and their other products. Secret Recipe is well known for their wide selection of cakes, consisting 40 types of cakes offered, brownies, wedding cakes, birthday cakes, Asian foods, juices, mocktail, coffees, Western food, Fusion foods and many others.

3. To provide foods in fast or minimal period of time. Secret Recipe offers their customer with minimal waiting time which will increase the customer satisfaction and also increasing productivity.

4. To provide quality, presentable and healthy foods and beverages. As for the food is manufactured in the centralized production plant, the quality of the products offered can be maintained and standardize. Food is also transported efficiently by using their own transportation services, handled carefully to avoid damage, spoilage, contamination of the food transported. It can help to keep the food healthy, fresh and high in quality.

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5. Product offered is affordable and competitive. Secret Recipe is targeting the middle income group of people to high end s, so they need to set the range of prices that meet the purchasing power of their target market. Price offered is reasonable with the high quality of product offered, but still competitive with other similar establishment range of prices.

6. Offering accessibility with option of dining in or take out. Emphasizing in the customer convenience, Secret Recipe offers accessibility with option of dining in or take out. Each of Secret Recipe outlets is designed with sophisticated and urban decoration, with comfortable tables and chairs to enhance the customer satisfaction. For takeout order, Secret Recipe provide each of their customer paper bag or cake box that is specially designed to protect the cakes from damages and for customer convenience.

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COMPETITIVE PRIORITIES WHAT? Competitive priorities are the steps or strength of the company that helps to differentiate the company with other company in the similar categories. It will be used by customer to perceive which better Order Qualifiers are offered. In this case, Secret Recipe successfully took over the throne by providing the best Oder Qualifiers compared to their competitors. It is proved by the awards they won and also the overall customer satisfaction towards their services and product offered. The competitive edges of Secret Recipe are mostly contributed by their franchise system which is listed below; 1. Financial 2. Marketing 3. Operation 4. Information 5. Services 6. Product

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WHY AND HOW? As Secret Recipe applying the franchising scheme, it has few advantages for both franchisor and franchisee as well as a quick way to setup own business without starting from the scratch. As for Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, it was franchised from Secret Recipe Malaysia and below are the competitive priorities that we believed used by the establishment. 1. Financial As for the franchisee, the financial risk is lower than the other ventures. It is because the investment costs are lower and profit margins are higher due to recognized brand name. 2. Marketing The Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu enjoys the benefit of operating under recognized name and trademark of Secret Recipe, which have high market result. Furthermore, all the marketing effort will be taken care of by the headquarters which they will save up the cost in of hiring more people and their own advertisings for marketing purposes compared to another venture. 3. Operation The Secret Recipe offered the Business Format Franchising complete packages and ensures a ready to go franchised unit. For Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, they can immediately start up their business and operations with the help from headquarter in of operation system, management, product, service standards and many others. It also helps to avoid unnecessary trial and error period in starting and operating a new business. As a franchisee, the establishment also have the opportunity to run a proven business concept with a successful operational track record.

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4, Information Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu has the opportunity to learn the latest developments and changes in the local and global market form the franchisor and focus entirely in developing the sales revenue. They also received specific and complete information as well as the access to accumulated business experience and technical information in managing the establishment. 5. Services As for the services aspect, the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu was provided with the standards of service that they need to deliver in correlation to standardize all the service provided by the brand. It has help to reduce the cost in of training, developing own service standards, minimize the chances of guest complaint, increase guest satisfaction and others. The standard of service provided is also higher than other competitor in the area or Kuala Terengganu specifically, the restaurant personnel also will be provided with training to make sure they can deliver the service that can meet the standard. 6. Product Secret Recipe not only offers a wide variety of cakes but the product concept is flexible by henceforth different menu items such as homemade brownies, exquisite coffee and beverages, fusion foods and others.

It is also easier for Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu as the purchasing system, storing and product display systems is already tailored by the franchisor. Secret Recipe has its own production plant in Klang Valley that produce the all the products for their branches. Therefore, the taste and quality of food are always the same as it is applied for the standard and quality control.

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ORDER WINNERS

Order winners are those competitive priorities that an individual company emphasizes to cause a customer to choose it over its competitors. It is also a condition where it is used as a criterion that customers use to differentiate the services or products of one firm from those to another. Secret Recipe’s order winners that help them to differentiate from the other competitors are;

1. Brand

2. Product

3. Ambience

4. Services and facilities

5. Value of money

6. Trend

7. Research

8. Marketing

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WHY AND HOW?

Why Secret Recipe is really emphasising in the order winners is simply because they want to stay in the market and at the same time anticipating the current needs, demands and trends or customers nowadays. In order to do so, Secret Recipe needs to provide better or different in all aspect from their competitors.

Based on our observation and research conducted at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, below are the order winners that we believed delivered at the establishment;

1. Brand Secret Recipe is already a household name which they selected unique product and unit market to concentrate with. Not many players who has cake restaurant which encourage customers to walk-in with family and dine inside the outlet. The competitors such as bakery was meant only to bake cake while Secret Recipe took it a step further by making bakery as restaurant as well by catering other foods besides cakes. Furthermore, their unique product is cake. Their target to represent secret recipe as identify for cake. Their selected unique market and product encourages them to move further in food and beverages industry which only contain few number of competitors or players. 2. Product Secret Recipe has been selected to reflect their well-guarded, homemade recipe of a vast selection of gourmet quality cheesecakes, chocolate cakes and others baked desserts. So, all of their food and cakes are homemade based on their own secret recipe. It also created a new lifestyle cult comprising of a loyal base of food and cake lovers.

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3. Ambience

Secret Recipe has a unified store design which leverages the business reputation in marketing the concept. By using red and white as their theme colour, Secret Recipe has created inviting ambience and delighting dining experience by offering comfortable dining room furniture ranging from the bistro tables, sofas, learning elements such as magazines and books.

Secret Recipe also has ambient sound of soft music, lighting, decorations, smells and others which will enhance the customer experience.

4. Services and facilities

With high level of services offered such as customized cake and convenient cake booking systems, friendly and anticipative services, dine in or take out services and also system that minimize the customer waiting time.

Facilities offered there is also better than the competitor such as free wireless high speed broadband, smoking and non smoking area, baby seats and many others. All the elements have help Secret Recipe to differentiate with the other competitor in the market.

5. Value of money

Secret Recipe offered high quality products with moderate and affordable range of prices as their target market is from middle income group to high income group. The range of prices offered for their products is also slightly higher than the competitor, but if compared to the taste and quality aspect, Secret Recipe has far lead and left their competitors behind thus increasing the value of the money.

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6. Trend

As for the information that we gained during our research, the trend in Kuala Terengganu market nowadays is the customers love to try new places and new product especially food. Dine out have become a common phenomena due to increasing buying power.

Customer nowadays is also rewarding themselves regularly with small affordable luxuries of dining out and foods, which make the Secret Recipe is the best place for them to pamper themselves after tiring day and hard work.

7. Research

Secret Recipe has another order winner compared to the competitors in the same industry which they do continuously research franchised system. They did not roll out pilot operation and figure out weakness and work out to improve it. They place research as an important factor for continuous growth. At the same time, the conduct market researcher will survey the demand before deciding to open franchise outlet there. This helps them to avoid doing mistake as no point opening a cake restaurant at where it is not asked or demanded for.

The Secret Recipe also conducted research on the customer satisfaction by having comment cards for the customers and mystery shoppers from the headquarters will come once a month to evaluate the branches. All the information and data collected can be accessed by Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu and used to enhance the service delivered.

8. Marketing

From the market research conducted by the Secret Recipe, they will always come out with new strategies that bring the competitive advantages for the in order to compete with their competitors. Secret Recipe has used difference channels to promote them such as online website, brochures, catalogues, flyers, newspaper and television ment and many others. Secret recipe will always identify, 22

research, and develop new products with speed, high quality, and reasonable cost. They will come out new products especially during some festivals to attract more customers such as they have come out with new set lunch and cakes during Valentine, Father’s and Mother’s day, Christmas, and so on. Promotions are done heavily during those festivals to increase customers’ awareness of new products they produced.

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S.W.O.T ANALYSIS STRENGTH 1. Brand As explained earlier, Secret Recipe has strong term on brand building earlier on by building easy to ed logo, corporate colour, marketing strategies, uniforms, menu layout. Interior design and customer service standards to differ than others. It has added the strength to the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu as they have the ownership of utilizing such a strong, unique and distinctive brand than its competitors. 2. Product The products offered at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu are high in standard and quality, which specially crafted and tailored by the Secret Recipe. The products are also closely monitored to maintain their quality at their production plant in Klang Valley and the restaurant also offers wide selections of secret recipe of homemade cakes, baked desserts, beverages, fusion foods and many others. 3. Marketing As the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu belonged to the Secret Recipe, they have the strength in of cost as well as the marketing channels. They have utilized various methods of advertising and marketing through internet, brochures, catalogues, flyers, newspapers and television ment and many others. They also offered special cakes and menus during special occasion such as Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and others. 4. Franchised System Franchise system is advantageous for Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu as they have the rights and access to data from the headquarters. All the tailored operational systems, purchasing systems, storing, products, service s standards, marketing and many others has bring ease of operations for Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu and minimize the drawbacks.

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5. Customers Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu has long list of loyal customers, which is the main contributors to their strength. Loyal customers are easier to handle and also cost lower to maintain than acquiring new customer. With the recognized brand, Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu has the chances to serve bigger market especially tourist that come to Kuala Terengganu.

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WEAKNESS 1. Price Even though the range of prices offered at Secret Recipe is affordable, but it is only focused to serve the middle income group and higher. Lower income group may not have the ability and chances to try their product and decrease the number of customer they could acquire. 2. Staff Turnover As other foodservice establishments is also experienced, the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu has witness the high staff turnover. Even though the problem is synonym with the industry, but it will increase the cost of operation in of acquiring new employees and training cost. 3. Parking Facilities Located in the heart of Kuala Terengganu city, Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu is situated beside the main road and only offers few parking lots. Busy streets, hard to find parking lot may lead to reducing number of customers if not handled carefully. 4. Language Barrier The employees at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu are lacked with the communication skills especially English. It will create problems to serve international market such as tourist that come to Kuala Terengganu. Company should train their staffs in term of the way of communication so that they can communicate confidently and fluency to their customer. This will make the customer feel welcomed.

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OPPORTUNITIES 1. The only Secret Recipe in Kuala Terengganu As the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu is the sole branch of the brand, the company have the opportunity to open another branch in the area due to high and increasing demand from the customer. It will help them to serve the market better and also increase their profit. 2. Trends As the trends nowadays that people love to dine out, trying new things and pamper themselves with small affordable luxuries, Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu has the opportunity to serve larger market and increase their profit. But as the trends is fluctuates over time, their opportunities may become their biggest threat.

THREAT 1. New hotels in the area As the tourism industry boost in Kuala Terengganu, it has witnessed many new hotels open in the area and most of the hotels offered their own bakery and pastries. It may become a threat to the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu as their numbers of competitors is rising.

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SECTION 2 THE CUSTOMERS Below are the profiles of Secret Recipe’s customers; a) Geographic - Geographically, Secret Recipe is targeting city of Kuala Terengganu which has a population of 407,000 people -The targeted market is around 200,000 people

b) Demographic - Male and female - Ages 20-54, this segment makes up 80% of the market - Young families who live in the urban area - Have attended college and/or graduate school - Middle to upper class income families - Eat out couple times a week - Prefer high quality restaurants

c) Behaviour factors - Enjoy a high quality meal without the mess of making it - Enjoy tasting different kind of food - Prefer quick and healthy meals - Health concern in regards of foods - Like good presentation of foods

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CUSTOMER SATISFACTION SURVEYS We have analyze the data and findings on the customer satisfactions based on two methods which is from the questionnaires that we have distributed at the restaurant and also the comment cards which is provided at the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu. We also take another extra step in analyzing the complaints or any service breakdowns from the Secret Recipe’s fan page on Facebook.

Method 1: Questionnaires We have conducted a small scale survey where we have distributed ten (10) questionnaires to the customers at the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu. The questionnaires consist of the customer’s satisfactions on the product, services and their overall satisfaction that they perceived from Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu.

Customers are asked to tick the boxes contained with the satisfaction levels ranging from “Very satisfied” until “Poor”. We have also included a column where customers can share their recommendations or complaint if any. Below are the findings from the survey;

Satisfaction on Service Service 6 4 2 0

Service

Based on the chart, it have stated that from ten (10) customers that patron Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, only one (1) is very satisfied with the service, four (4) customer felt satisfied and the other five (5) customer felt the service is good.

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Satisfaction on Food and Beverages Product 6 4 2 0

Product

Surveys on the products that sold at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, three (3) of the customers very satisfied with the product and five (5) of them is satisfied. Meanwhile, another two (2) customers perceived that the product is good.

Overall Satisfaction

Service 8 6 4 2 0

Service

Based on overall satisfaction that combined both aspect of services and products, there is only one (1) customer that is very satisfied, seven (7) customer is satisfied and other two (2) felt overall is good.

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We have concluded that most of the customer is satisfied with the services and product offered at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu due to “Satisfied” has recorded highest satisfaction perceived by the customers and there is also none of them are dissatisfied.

Method 2: Customer Satisfaction Surveys The customer satisfaction survey was conducted by Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu by providing comment cards that can be fill up by customers if they have any complaint, recommendations or others towards the organization. The data later need to be send to headquarter as a requirement for each branch in order to improve their services.

Sadly, we did not managed to get the data from their surveys but verbally they informed us that they did not have many complaints, only minor complaints such as food is late or cold which they immediately solve the problem.

Method 3: Secret Recipe Fan Page on Facebook

Due to no complaint from the survey conducted at Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu, we have taken extra effort in analyzing the complaint that happened at other branches for additional information. The best place is to find it online, which is on the Secret Recipe Facebook Fan Page. The complaints screenshot is provided in the appendices. Below are content of the complaints received;

Complaint #1 : Service breakdown The customer had ordered a customized birthday cake earlier and when they day she want to pick up the order, she realized that the staff over there forgot to place the order.

Complaint #2 : Unfriendly and bad service The customer experience unfriendly and inattentive service where the staff forgot to give straw and later provide them with used straw. Food received is overcooked, and the food is also late.

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Complaint #3 : Service breakdown and did not deliver promise There is a promotion where if a customer pay using a Citibank cards, they will get free slice of cake for every RM10 they spent. When this customer asked the staff, staff mentioned there is no such promotions but then when she want to pay, it has become clear that the promotions is valid and the staff just neglect to serve the customer.

Complaint #4: Low level of service and food is late When this customer came and dines in at the restaurant, she have ordered simple menu and have waited for 50 minutes to get the order. In fact, she received the order later than others that came after her. She was disappointed since she needs to rush due to short lunch hour.

Complaint #5 : Unfriendly service and rude staffs This customer want to cancel an order and add another order but the staff just walk away when called and pretend like she did not hear anything.

Complaint #6 : Staff is not attentive and playing around When this customer placed the order, he has waited for quite a time for the food and was informed that the kitchen was having problem with the stove. But the staff later went for chit chat with his other colleagues and when the manager approached them, they quickly went back to work and the customer’s order arrived shortly after that.

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SECTION 3 RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 1. Customer’s Perspective Problems After analyzing the complaint received from the Secret Recipe Facebook Fan Page, we have noticed that all the complaints that made are caused by the Secret Recipe employees and service they had. Employees are rude, not attentive, not friendly, did not deliver their promise and many others. Due to this problem, Secret Recipe has lost many of their loyal customers and this condition is very costly to the company. Suggestion and Recommendation 

Training

Every employee of Secret Recipe is provided with training, but we believed that the training content is maybe no enough to stimulate the sense of responsibility towards representing the brand name and image. A better and clearer training should be emphasized and it should be able to make each employee really understand what the service philosophy of Secret Recipe is and also always make them that they are representing the brand of Secret Recipe. A short, simple and different topic of training can be included in the daily briefing in opening of every shift. 

Employee Recognition Programme

“ If we take care of our employee, our employee will take care of our customer” or “We are ladies and gentlemen who are serving ladies and gentlemen” are the motto by JW Marriott and The Ritz Carlton who really emphasized in making their employee delighted in doing their work. As for Secret Recipe, they do not have any employee recognition program, which make sense of why the customer service is bad. Employee recognition program would make the employee feel appreciated, happy and delighted to work with the 33

company. It can be done in many ways, both in materials or psychological. Employee of the month, best service rewards, up-selling program and many others

can

be

done

and

these

methods

are

tested

and

proven.

2. From our perspective Problem Based on our observation and research conducted, we did not see any problems occurring at the Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu which is good for them but we do noticed that most of the staff there cannot communicate very well especially in English. Suggestion and Recommendation Secret Recipe Kuala Terengganu should train their staffs in term of the way of proper communication with the customer so that they can communicate confidently and fluency to the costumer and make them feel welcome. Encourage them to speak in English as it will improve the level of service.

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CONCLUSION As for the conclusion, order qualifiers, competitive priorities and order winners are proven to become one of the key of success in the business. As for the Secret Recipe, they have utilizing the concept very well that differs them from the other competitors and made them the sole choice for having a nice and exquisite slice of cake. Franchising scheme has also become one of their remarkable key of success until they have become the household name for bakery product in Malaysia. All the operation and service aspect has been carefully designed, tailored with the current demand and needs of the customer. Constant research and development of service problems and new product is conducted to ensure efficient service and trends are met. Even with high service standards and constant research efforts, still the service of Secret Recipe is getting lower. This may be caused by the lack of attention from the management itself and also lack of awareness among the employees. Proactive measures should be taken in order to prevent complaint which will reduce in numbers of customers. From the research that we have conducted, we have understood the importance of all three traits to a business and how it can lead to success. We really hope that we could use this information not only for academic purposes, but also in our future career growth.

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REFERENCE Cik Sharifah Amirah Outlet Supervisor Secret Recipe, Kuala Terengganu

Secret Recipe Malaysia, www.secretrecipe.com.my

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APPENDICES

Figure 1 : Complaint 1

Figure 2 : Complaint 2

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Figure 3 : Complaint 3

Figure 4 : Complaint 4 38

Figure 5 : Complaint 5

Figure 6 : Complaint 6

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Figure 5 : Interview Session 1

Figure 7 : Interior Design 1

Figure 6 : Interview Session 2

Figure 8 : Interior Design 2

Figure 9 : Interior Design 3 40